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Published: August 6th 2006
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So I just got back from a trip last week to China. First, I flew to Shanghai for 4 days and then took a train to Beijing for the rest of the week. Shanghai had a really unique atmosphere that I’d never experienced before in a city. I’d say it’s the coolest city in Asia that I’ve seen after Hanoi, but they’re really different. After first getting to the super modern Pudong airport my friends and I took a new train they have into Shanghai called the Maglev. Somehow this thing runs on magnets and goes over 400 Kilometers an hour, which my Canadian friend translated into miles as “F’ing fast.” So while speeding by at what felt like light speed, we’re passing old picturesque neighborhoods that could have been straight out of a Jackie Chan movie. So this turned out to be a great introduction to Shanghai, and China in general, modernizing at a breakneck speed through rice fields and history. A perfect place to use the old “city of contrast” cliché.
The first day we walked around the Bund, an area full of huge old buildings with influences from all over the world. A lot of them seemed
to be abandoned and hardly touched for decades. Since its more of a business district and empties at night, it also left a really creepy feeling after dark surrounded by these huge and silent buildings, but that’s were are hostel was so we spent a lot of time there. Another cool place was Old Town. This is a rapidly disappearing area of Shanghai were people live in traditional neighborhoods that really hold a lot of charm to our western eyes. It’s all the stereotypes of what China would be like: huge swooping tiled roofs, laundry strung out over the streets, and people basically living on top of each other. I was using the “toilet” in one of the streets when a lady came out next to me and dumped out her chamber pot with a huge grin. Evidently these houses are so old they don’t even have plumbing. The set up of these places is really cool too because they have a big square with a courtyard in the middle. All the extended families live in bedrooms surrounding the courtyard and eat together and hang out in this communal area. But now as Shanghai’s property value skyrockets, these ole neighborhoods
are being razed for big skyscraping apartment buildings, adding nothing to the charm of Shanghai. Soon all that will be left are recreations of these neighborhoods for tourist with nice shiny Starbucks and Haagen-Dazs, yippee. On the other hand, if I had the choice of where to live, I doubt it’d be anywhere near a chamber pot.
I also got to see Pudong which is a relatively new area of Shanghai full of ultra-modern and experimental skyscrapers. Across the river from the ole stone buildings of the Bund, this place looks very out of place. One of the weirdest things about walking around there was the lack of smaller buildings or shops between them. It’s like a ghost town, yet brand new. The thing about this area is that 10 years ago it was farm land that was bought up and developed as the money came rolling in. Later that day we went to Nanjing Street which could have been right off the Vegas Strip. Huge flashing signs were advertising everything from Adidas to Gucci…kinda blows the whole exotic travels in China feeling that Old Town gives you.
At night we pretty much hung out around the guesthouse.
It really reminded me of traveling last year, swapping travel stories with the backpackers and finding out where the new “cool” places to go are. I met one English couple who’ve been traveling for a year or so, picking fruit in Australia and working as florist in India to pay their way. One night we met a group of 5 people walking around aimlessly who asked us where to party. It turned out they had all just met on a flight from Sydney and had a 12 hour layover to see Shanghai. At about 2am we headed for the only nightclub still open called the “Red Lounge.” We got there to find it just closing and a steady parade of Shanghai’s big moneyed socialites coming out and into their chauffeured Mercedes. All the while gangs of women and children where climbing over themselves to beg them for change….weird to say the least.
The food in Shanghai was insane. They had every kind of restaurant you could think of, from Manchurian to Sichuan to Southern (an expat from Texas opened up a real BBQ restaurant). The Chinese food was a lot better than what you get at home, but no
less greasy which was a surprise. What was the same was the fact that you’re starving ten minutes after you eat, so we ate constantly. Man it was cheap too. We would order a table full of food, drinks and all, and it was never more than 5 or 6 bucks for everything. Awesome.
The last night we took an overnight train ride to Beijing in 1st class since everything else was full. It was the nicest train I’ve ever been on and had a dining car were you could watch a guy in a chef hat prepare your food. Nothing like a good exchange rate to make you feel first class.
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Mcc1203
Traveltabel
hey
hey fella i`m also in korea working, your blogs pretty impressive you`ve gotten around a bit! Ive not been to Seoul yet and am heading up there in a few weeks, anything you`d recommend me to see/ do/ go to ? carla.mccoy@talk21.com my blog name is just carlamccoy cheers